


Retrograde

by Daxolotl



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Alex doesn't die I promise, Enemies to Lovers, F/F, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Brainwashing, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Torture, Memory Loss, Minor Injuries, Not permanently at least, Recovery, Winter Soldier Alex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-23 11:04:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17079125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daxolotl/pseuds/Daxolotl
Summary: She watches a funeral pod start the long journey towards Sol; flies with it through the atmosphere. She stares at it, watching it curve with the Earth, as she hovers at the edge of the thin blue line.Her lungs burn. She can't breathe.Alex is gone.





	1. Deaf

**Author's Note:**

  * For [silverwriter01](https://archiveofourown.org/users/silverwriter01/gifts).



> _This is my Kalex Secret Santa gift to Silverwriter01. You mentioned liking hurt/comfort, rivals, and hating-to-loving…so, here you go! A little bit of all three._

Supergirl struggles against her restraints. She can't move. No matter how many times she tries, no matter how hard she tries to force it, she's held still. She's not strong enough. She's never strong enough.

"Supergirl," Alex says from next to her, gently, and she stills. "Save your strength. We'll get you out of this, okay?"

Supergirl looks to her left. Where she's locked to a wall with Nth metal, held totally still, Alex is simply handcuffed and chained to the floor, still wearing her DEO uniform. On any other day, she'd scoff at her captors for underestimating her sister – but today, with a knife wound in her leg, and with the bones of her left wrist shattered, it might be just enough to hold Alex in place. Just.

Supergirl stares into Alex's eyes, meeting her gaze.

"I'll get you out of this."

Then Lex Luthor walks in, and everything becomes hazy.

He rants to a camera. Rants to Supergirl. Talks about aliens, and Kryptonians, and the ruination of all human life on Earth. It blurs together, right up until he pulls out the kryptonite bullets. The sickly feeling burns Supergirl down to her bones, and she shudders in a breath.

"No. Don't do this, Lex," Alex tries, begging, as he loads rounds into his revolver. "Come on. Supergirl's a national hero. If you do this, you'll lose all support you ever might have had."

He scoffs, and raises the gun. "When I do this, my support will grow tenfold. People around the world will finally see how _mortal_ their gods really are."

"I love you, Alex," Supergirl whispers, and closes her eyes.

"No!"

There's a surge of magnetism. A gunshot. Loud. Piercing. But no pain.

Supergirl opens her eyes. 

The gun is facing in the wrong direction, angled to Supergirl's left like it was forced away. And Lex is just staring. What is he staring at?

It's too quiet, she suddenly realises.

She looks left.

No.

Everything blurs.

Rage. Pain. Screaming. _Burning._

She watches a funeral pod start the long journey towards Sol; flies with it through the atmosphere. She stares at it, watching it curve with the Earth, as she hovers at the edge of the thin blue line.

Her lungs burn. She can't breathe. She can't breathe, she can't breathe, she can't breathe.

Supergirl falls.

Kara jerks awake.

Her sheets are slick with sweat, and she groans, rubbing her eyes and checking the clock, the only light in her room. 4:02am. Better than she usually manages.

There's a skittering through the apartment, and a dog leaps on to the bed, nuzzling Kara's neck worriedly. "Hey, Gertrude. Yeah, another nightmare. Don't worry about it, girl. You should go back to bed. At least one of us should sleep."

Gertrude whines, and Kara leans in to hug her.

"I know, girl. I miss her too."

_ _ _

Kara stumbles into CatCo, coffee clutched in one hand as she reads through an article on her phone. There are dark rings around her eyes, and her clothing is rumpled, but that's nothing new anymore. She barely registers the hubbub of activity around her, but when she does she frowns, looking up from her phone and towards the people crowding in James's office. She follows, joining them and finding Nia and Lena standing at the back of the room.

"Hey, did I miss something about a team meeting?"

Lena and Nia look at her, the usual look in their eyes. The look Kara hates. She tries to ignore it, focusing instead on the people in the room.

"Cadmus announced they were going to be doing a broadcast today," Nia says. "You didn't see the news?"

Kara frowns. "Since when does Cadmus announce their broadcasts in advance?"

"Maybe their viewing figures have gone down," Lena says, dryly.

As if on cue, the televisions in James's office flicker to life. Instead of the usual computerised face, there's a woman. A human woman, probably. It's not easy to tell with her face covered by a mask and a pair of goggles, but the hair at least looks human – an auburn bob.

"I guess Cadmus finally found a new frontwoman now Lillian's in hiding."

Lena snorts. "Well, after what Supergirl did to my brother, I can't imagine the job has been particularly _in-demand_."

"People of National City," the voice begins, distortion effects layered heavily. Kara doubts the DEO will be able to decipher anything from it, Cadmus has always been careful with these things. "For too long, you have lived beneath a being who has declared herself a demigod. An alien invader, who does what she pleases. For years, she claimed to be here _peacefully_ , but six months ago, she murdered Lex Luthor."

The camera switches from the woman's mask to black-and-white CCTV footage. Kara gasps and squeezes her eyes shut, reaching out to grip Lena's hand. There's no sound, but she swears she can hear it again. She can _feel_ it all again.

"This alien is a murderer. A cold-blooded killer who floats above National City and claims ownership of it. But this is not her city. This is a city of humans. And we intend to take it back. We Are Cadmus."

There's the usual cacophony of noise and images that accompanies the end of any Cadmus message, and the crowd starts to dissipate. 

"Well," Lena begins, after a moment. "That seemed a remarkably pointless little video from them. The same as it ever was, really. Something something, aliens are the enemy, something something, expect us." She's being overly flippant, Kara knows. Compensating for seeing her brother's death again. She squeezes Kara's hand reassuringly then pulls away, flexing her fingers. 

Kara winces guiltily. She probably almost broke Lena's hand. "Yeah. Nothing new there. I'll, uh. I need to take a minute, okay? I'll be back and ready to work in no time, I'm just…"

Lena nods reassuringly. "Of course, I understand. Whatever you need."

Kara steps back, out of the office, walking until she feels less like she's about to throw up. She and Lena both lost siblings that day. But Lex was a monster. A sexist, racist sycophant with a god complex, in Lena's own words. She might mourn the loss of the person he had once been, but she'd been mourning _that_ loss for years.

Kara? Kara lost someone so much more than her sister.

As she slips into an empty supply room and opens a window, pulling open her shirt to reveal the crest beneath, she feels it again. She lost her whole world.

_ _ _

Bank robbers. Why are there still bank robbers in National City? She rips off the door of their escape van, grabbing the driver and smacking his face against it before turning to throw it at a man carrying bags of money. He drops to the floor with a thud, and the third attacker starts shooting at her. The bullets ricochet away, and she super-speeds forwards, knocking his gun aside and lifting him up. She opens the back of the escape van, placing him inside with a pair of handcuffs and closing the door after him. "You've got ten minutes to cuff yourself. If you don't, then when I come back in there I'm going to hit you."

Then she's hit in the back.

She goes flying, the wind knocked out of her, and scrapes across the floor. She staggers to her feet, turning to face whatever just attacked her…and sees an entire Cadmus hit squad advancing. One of them even has a Child of Liberty mask. Ugh. So last year. Their weapons have a sickly green glow to them. Right. So _this_ is what they meant when they said they intended to take it back. Great. She rolls her shoulders, cracking her neck and squaring up.

There's an electronic whine and the leader's rifle lights up brighter, launching a pulse of green energy at her that blasts her backwards again.

Then she's on the move. She launches herself into the air, using heat vision to try and hit one of the guards in their stupid jackboots, then superspeeds forwards to knock the second to the ground. She's hit in the side by another blast but powers through it, grabbing the weapon and turning it to one side before headbutting the enforcer in his stupid Liberty mask. Then she spins, using a cape trick to grab the weapon of the last one and yank him forwards, punching him in his stupid throat.

She hates Cadmus. They're stupid.

A gun goes off. Kara's faced with pain, searing through her leg. She gasps and clutches it, dropping to one knee. She's bleeding. Is that…there's green in the wound, and she looks up to see her attacker.

There she is. The woman from the broadcast. Her mask is firmly in place, and she holds a pistol in one hand and a kryptonite sword in the other. Kara's eyes widen and she lifts off, flying to take cover as the woman starts shooting again.

Bullets thud against the escape van and she winces as she feels the kryptonite in the air, weakening her just by being near it. And the chunk in her leg isn't helping matters.

There's a break in the shooting, and Kara rushes around the corner, swinging for a wide punch.

The soldier blocks it.

That's impossible.

Her arm is raised, holding Kara's fist back like it's a mild inconvenience. Like she saw it coming.

Kara tries to use her x-ray vision despite the kryptonite in the air. The mask is lead-lined, protecting her attacker's identity. But that's not what interests her. There. Her left arm's been replaced from the elbow downwards; made mechanical. Like Jeremiah. Like Cyborg Superman. 

Cadmus has a new supersoldier.

The kryptonite sword sings through the air and Kara ducks with as much super-speed as she can manage, jabbing the woman in the stomach. She's weakened from the kryptonite, but it's still enough to make her attacker drop the sword and stagger backwards.

There's a growl, manipulated by the mask's filter, and the woman swings her left arm forwards, punching Kara in the face and knocking her to the floor. A kick follows it up, And, oh, rao, that's a metal leg too. Kara's sent flying backwards into the van, denting it. She hears the robber loudly complaining inside the van, but she doesn't have time to worry about that right now when the agent draws a kryptonite knife from a sheath, spinning it in her fingers in a way that brushes at the edges of Kara's memories. She's seen that move before, somewhere.

Then she doesn't have time to reflect, and they're fighting.

Kara blocks, turning the blade away from herself like she was taught to. And the woman responds, countering Kara's counters at every turn. Kara punches, but she ducks as if it was predictable. The woman goes for a grapple, but Kara knows how to break out of it and lifts them off the ground, flying a few feet up then throwing the woman back to earth and smashing back down after her. And the woman responds by dodging the punch to the ground, rolling out of the way a moment before impact and slashing across Kara's arm, drawing blood. Attack, counter, counter-counter, riposte.

It's all a little too familiar.

They both stagger to their feet. Kara doesn't know about her rival, but she's exhausted. She raises her fists.

The Cadmus agent flips her knife, pointing the tip towards Kara. Probably not that exhausted, then.

She charges, and Kara grabs her blade arm, feeling her proximity to kryptonite sapping her strength. They both go down, the woman pinning her to the ground and moving her mechanical arm to grip the blade, trying to drive it down into Kara's chest.

Kara struggles, gripping her arm and trying to find anything she can grab to force the agent away. One hand claws at the woman's mask and pushes, trying to force her away, before Kara's boots finally find the ground. Right. She can still fly.

She kicks off from the floor, spinning them both in midair over and over again until the Cadmus agent loses her grip. As she spins, there's the clack of her phone slipping from her boot and cracking against the floor, followed by the kryptonite blade bouncing off the asphalt. Then, as a last ditch effort, Kara brings both legs up and kicks the woman in the chest, knocking her into the side of the van hard enough to dent it again.

There's a few moments of silence, as Kara comes to land on the floor, feet crunching against broken glass.

A mask dangles limply from her hand.

And in front of her, an impossible woman looks up. Forces auburn hair out of her eyes and rubs the back of her hand over her nose, smearing blood across her face.

"Alex…" Kara says, with impossible softness. With disbelief.

Former Director Alexandra Danvers, deceased, falters. The rage in her eyes dims.

"How the fuck do you know my name?"

There's an electronic whine, and Kara's slammed forwards, into the van. Then there's only darkness.


	2. Blind

Supergirl struggles against her restraints. She can't move. No matter how many times she tries, no matter how hard she tries to force it, she's held still. She's not strong enough. She's never strong enough.

"Supergirl," Alex says from next to her, gently, and she stills. "Save your strength. We'll get you out of this, okay?"

Supergirl looks to her left. Where she's locked to a wall with Nth metal, held totally still, Alex is simply handcuffed and chained to the floor, wearing black armour. Her arm flickers and distorts, and for a moment, Supergirl sees smooth metal instead of broken bone.

Supergirl stares into Alex's eyes, meeting her gaze.

"I'll get you out of this."

Then Lex Luthor walks in, and everything becomes bright green and pain and silence. She can't breathe, she can't breathe, she can't breathe.

"Alex!"

Kara jerks awake.

Her hands and feet are held tight by restraints, she's held upright on a metal slab, and for a moment she thinks she's back in her nightmare. But when she opens her eyes, squinting against the red lamps surrounding her, it's not a Luthor standing before her. It's Alex.

"Supergirl," she says, mask back in place to distort her voice, but dark goggles missing. Her eyes, normally so vibrant, look flat. She steps towards her, away from a plain metal table with a pistol atop it.

"Alex. You're alive. Oh, Rao, it's really you, you're really alive. How are you alive? Why are you working with Cadmus? Why am I tied—" too many questions at once. "What's going on?"

"How do you know me?" she asks, and Kara comes crashing down to earth.

"Wh-…" How does she even answer that? "I'm…Alex, come on, you know me. You've known me since I was thirteen years old. It's me. It's Kara. You _know_ me."

There's a few moments of silence.

"I don't know any 'Kara'."

Kara's blood runs cold, and she laughs. She can't help it. She laughs; In disbelief. In overwhelming emotion. In…she doesn't even know. She gets Alex back, after six months of thinking she's dead, and she…what? Pretends she doesn't know her? Kara stares into Alex's eyes, but there's nothing there. Oh, no.

The door slams open. "Agent Danvers," a voice begins, and Kara's day gets even worse. Lillian Luthor. "I don't believe I gave you permission to interrogate our prisoner."

Alex straightens her back, standing to attention. "I was monitoring her, ma'am. Nothing more."

Lillian approaches, heels clicking against the floor. "Hmph." She doesn't sound convinced. "Yes, well, run along for now. I'll call you when you're needed for the final phase."

Alex nods, tersely, and walks out of the room without another word. Kara watches her go every step of the way, yearning to reach out and touch her.

Once the door is shut, Kara glares, wishing she could summon even a little heat vision to make her eyes glow. "What did you do to her?"

Lillian smirks. "Do you like it? Jeremiah recommended recruiting her. I know, really, that he just wanted to save his _favoured_ daughter's life, and everything else was just an excuse. But after what you did to my poor boy…well, it only seemed right."

"What only seemed right?"

"Resurrecting her. I wanted it to be Lex, but…well, let's just say that to bring someone back from the dead, they need to have a _body_ left behind, and you, you little monster, couldn't even leave my son with that." Lillian sneers. "She's going to kill you, Kara Danvers," Kara can't help but shudder at the way the woman says her name. "Once I'm done with you, once I've cut you open and hurt you in the ways you've hurt me, she's going to pick up that gun over there and shoot you with the same kryptonite bullet that killed her. Her face will be the last thing you ever see."

No. No, absolutely not. Kara jerks against her restraints, trying to fight them. "She won't do it. No matter what you did to her, she won't kill me."

Lillian laughs, sharp and piercing. "Cadmus is all she remembers now. We told her that her loyal father recruited her years ago. He brought her into the family business of alien extermination, and in return for her noble work, Supergirl cut off two of her limbs and almost killed her. Supergirl killed her mother."

"You really think that your lies are going to stay in her head forever?" Kara asks, false bravado in her voice.

"Forever? Oh, no. She's an inquisitive woman. I'm sure with a little digging in an unsecured network she'd be able to find out that Eliza Danvers is alive and well, and find out all about her _sister_. But we don't need her to believe it forever. We just need to believe it until you're dead."

Lillian pulls on a surgical mask, hooking it over her ears and lifting a green-glowing scalpel. "Now, do try to hold still. This will hurt quite a lot."

_ _ _

At some point, the torture stops. The lamps are switched from red sunlight to yellow, and a visor was placed over Kara's head. Presumably to stop her heat visioning through the entire building. She can feel her wounds stitching themselves back together, and her body shudders and shakes at the feeling.

The door clicks closed, and Kara looks up. Her visor doesn't let her see anything. "Who's there?" she asks, trying to put a little courage into her tone despite the pain.

"Your name…is Kara Danvers," Alex's voice says, softly. There's no filter this time, and Kara could cry from how good it feels to hear her voice again, outside of the endlessly-repeated voicemails and messages Kara's heard over the last six months. "You were adopted by Jeremiah and Eliza Danvers."

"Yes," Kara sobs, nodding. "Yes, Alex. I'm your sister. You remember?"

There's a few seconds of silence, and Kara wishes beyond anything that she could _see_ right now.

"No." 

Her heart breaks.

"I don't remember. I took your phone. Disabled the tracking devices, obviously. When you recognised me, I wanted to know more. So I took it, to find out. My thumbprint unlocked it, and when that happened I _knew_ I had to know more. It all reads like some…alternate history of my life. Some things are the same, but others are…totally different. I don't remember any of it."

"It's real, I promise. What Cadmus has told you, whatever they said about me, about aliens, it's all lies. You work…you worked at the DEO. You _protected_ humans and aliens. We worked together." Kara tries as hard as she can to make herself sound believable. She needs this. Needs her sister back.

"Then what happened to me?" Alex asks. "If you're so mighty, so powerful, then how did Cadmus get hold of me? How did I get injured, if you didn't attack me?"

Kara shudders involuntarily. Burning. She can smell so, so much burning. "You, um. You were murdered. By Lex Luthor."

"That doesn't make any sense. I'm alive. And Lex was a hero, he would've never hurt me."

Kara tries to ignore the wave of nausea she feels at hearing _Alex_ talk about Lex Luthor like that. "That clip in the video you recorded for Cadmus earlier? The footage from Lex's lab, when I…when I killed him. You were just out of frame, tied up too. You tried to talk him down, but he wouldn't listen. He didn't know your suit has… _had_ magnetisation technology. Right before he would've shot me, you pulled his gun to the side."

There's a hiss, a sharp intake of breath.

"The bullet hit you. I…I couldn't protect you, and you died in front of me. And I was just. I was so _angry_."

"So…what? You're telling me that Cadmus brought me back from the dead? Gave me false memories? Why?" Alex sounds frustrated, pacing back and forth. Boots stomping across the floor.

"Because Lillian wanted to punish me for killing Lex. She brought you back, because she knows you being the one to kill me would break my heart. And she knows I could never fight back against you. You're the perfect weapon for her."

"None of this makes sense. It's all…I mean, it makes _sense_ , but I don't…I don't _remember_ any of what you're saying."

The door slams open again.

"That's quite enough of that, Agent Danvers."

Half a dozen guards marching in. Guns. Lillian's heels. Alex's boots, moving closer to Kara.

"Is what she said true?"

Lillian scoffs. "Of course it isn't true. How do you think the Supers endeared themselves to the public and got so far into power? They coerce, and manipulate, and lie. It should take more than a phone full of false memories and a pretty face to trick you. We're a resistance movement, Agent. We _resist_ our invaders."

Kara struggles against her restraints. "Alex, don't listen to her. Please. You're my sister. You've…you've got a scar on your right arm, it should still be there. You got that from a piece of debris from a car that exploded when we were kids. I couldn't protect you then. I couldn't protect you from Lex."

"Agent. Step away from the prisoner. Now." A safety clicks off. "Who do you trust? An alien outsider? Or your father? Do you truly think Jeremiah would lie to you?"

"Alex. _Please_. I love you. Please believe me."

"You're right," Alex says, voice calm. Collected. "I apologise, Director Luthor. The Supers are good at getting into my head, is all. I apologise for going against orders."

_No_! "Alex!"

"It's quite alright, Agent; their deceptions can work on even the best of us. Stand down, everyone." Guns are lowered. People start to relax. "Now, step away from the prisoner."

Alex subvocalises. " _Look to your one o'clock._ " The murmur is low, too low for anyone without super-hearing to pick up.

Kara turns her head slightly to the right. She doesn't hesitate. It's Alex. She'd never hesitate for her.

There's a pair of gunshots, then the visor is being yanked from Kara's face, crushed in Alex's robotic hand. Alex ducks low, and Kara shoots heat vision straight ahead, knocking two Cadmus agents and Lillian to the ground, injured, before focusing her vision on the wall behind them, blasting it open.

Alex's pistol looses another five kryptonite rounds as she spins around Kara's slab, using it (and Kara) as cover against the returning salvo of normal, lead bullets.

"I really hope I don't regret getting you out of this!" she shouts over the din of gunfire, reloading. "Ready to move, Supergirl?"

"Ready!"

Alex shoots again, and the restraints on Kara's hands and feet release, dropping her to the floor. She falls, wincing as her wounds shift and reopen, then charges into action.

She's got the remaining Cadmus agents disarmed in seconds, knocking them around the room. Alex marches out of her cover, shooting a fallen, injured guard in the head as she goes. Kara winces at the show of brutality.

She uses her x-ray vision, peering through the door and seeing a squad of men armed with the kryptonite-powered energy rifles rushing towards their room. "We should move. It looks like we're overstaying our welcome."

She grabs Alex by the waist, and a small part of Kara revels at finally being able to _touch_ her again.

"Get us out of here. I have a lot of questions."

Kara superspeeds them both through the hole she carved into the wall, and a few moments later, they're airborne.

She should fly them both to the DEO. To people who can analyse her. But there's too much there, too many people who'd expect Alex to recognise them.

She needs to take them somewhere quieter.

Somewhere safer.

Home.


	3. Ageusia

"So this is Supergirl's apartment?" Alex asks as Kara floats them both through the window, stepping forwards and running her fingers over the countertop. The sight of her here, after so long, is enough to almost render Kara speechless. Almost.

"It's Kara's apartment," she corrects. "I thought we could come here to talk first. The DEO would have…a lot of people for you to deal with."

Alex wrinkles her nose in distaste. "Yeah, no thanks. One alien telling me we used to know each other is as much as I can handle right now. Let's not add a whole organisation of people I apparently used to lead just yet."

Kara nods in agreement, moving her way around the cardboard boxes littering her apartment.

"Moving out?" Alex asks, frowning at the boxes.

"Oh. No, these are…these are all from your old place. Your lease ran out a few months ago, so…I brought all your stuff here. I couldn't bear to get rid of any of it." Kara pauses, biting her lip and considering her next words carefully. "You should look through some of it. See if any of it feels familiar."

Alex sighs.

"Supergirl. Look, I know you want me to remember everything you're telling me, but the truth is, I just don't. When I look at you, I don't see a sister, I don't see 'Kara Danvers'; I don't see anyone I know. I just see a _target_."

Kara swallows back the lump in her throat at that. She knew that. But knowing it didn't make it any easier to hear out loud. "Then why did you help me?"

"…Because I feel like you might be telling the truth." Alex runs her fingers through her hair, in just the way she always used to. "And even if you aren't, I know for a fact that Cadmus was lying to me. They might've taken away most of my memories, but I'm still smart enough to know they were cutting pieces apart for their own narrative."

"Yeah. They do that a lot."

"Director Luthor always thought she could control me. And Jeremiah...he always looked at me sadly. Like he was expecting something else from me."

Kara winces. Of course. "Jeremiah…is complicated. He always just wanted to protect the two of us. But he was willing to do…terrible, terrible things to keep us safe. I guess I shouldn't be surprised he persuaded Cadmus to bring you back, even if they tried to turn you into their weapon."

"They didn't _try_ to turn me into their weapon, Supergirl. There are a dozen ways I could kill you right now." 

_Kara_ , she wants to mentally correct her. _Only Kara_. But…not right now. So instead, she just shrugs. "Maybe. But you turned against them. Saw through their lies. Broke us out. "

"Then I'm not a very good weapon," Alex snarks.

"But you're a great person."

Kara smiles softly at Alex, staring into her eyes.

There's skittering through the apartment, and Alex draws her pistol, aiming it first at Kara, then towards the source of the noise. Kara superspeeds protectively in front of Gertrude, and Alex curses. 

"Damn it! You didn't tell me you had a dog." She doesn't lower the gun, not yet.

"Sorry! Sorry."

Gertrude barks happily, licking Kara's cheek then running over to greet Alex. Runs around her, brushing against her legs, nuzzling her.

Alex tries to look stern, tries to keep her gun level on Kara's chest. Kara can see her finger tensing, jaw tight. But then Gertrude bumps against the back of Alex's legs, sending her staggering forwards, and she laughs. Honest to god _laughs_ , and it's the best sound Kara has heard in her entire life.

Alex holsters her pistol again. Doesn't apologise. "What's her name?" She says instead, dropping down to rub behind the dog's ears.

"Gertrude."

Alex pauses in her scritchings. "Huh. Good name."

Kara smiles, softly. "I'm glad you think so. You're the one who named her, after all."

"Oh."

They fall silent for a few seconds.

"She was mine?"

"Yeah." Kara nods. "When you, uh…after everything, I took her in. We'd both always wanted a dog, and you always told me that she—"

"—was as much yours as she was mine," Alex finishes, absently, running her fingers through Gertrude's hair.

They both seem to realise what she said at the same time, freezing up.

Alex turns to look at Kara, holding up a robotic finger threateningly.

"Don't look at me like that. I said one thing that was obvious, that _anyone_ could have guessed. That doesn't mean I'm instantly gonna be all…buddy-buddy with you, Super."

"Buddy-buddy?" Kara quirks an eyebrow.

Alex doesn't respond, getting to her feet and pulling off her jacket, throwing it across the back of the couch in the exact way she always used to and starting to walk through the rest of the apartment. There's tension in her shoulders now, an anxious energy.

Kara's eyes flick to her left forearm, watching the skeletal metal servos move and flex as Alex starts walking through the apartment. Her eyes rake over Alex as the woman searches and explores. Being brought back from the dead hasn't hurt her musculature at all, even if her hair is longer than it was. Her unmodified, flesh-and-blood hand comes to rest on her holster, just like it always has, and she opens a box to find a picture near the top. It's an old one, of Kara and Alex as teenagers, with Eliza next to them. All smiling, even if it was a little forced with the weight of Jeremiah's loss over their heads.

"Weird," Alex mutters to herself, and drops the photograph back down to keep searching.

Kara just watches. Just stares.

"Eliza's still alive?"

Kara nods.

"You didn't kill her?"

"She's practically a second mother to me. I'd never do anything to hurt her, I promise. If you want, later, I could, um, I could phone her. You don't have to talk to her, I could just…put it on speaker, let you hear her voice."

Alex's breath catches, but she doesn't say anything else. Instead, she just resumes digging through the box. Of course, she'd pick a box of photographs to start with. It made sense.

Kara approaches Alex slowly, but it must still be a little too fast, and Alex turns, kryptonite knife halfway drawn. 

Kara feels the nausea of Kryptonite overtake her, and stops moving.

Alex's other hand is holding a picture frame of the two of them, but Kara shouldn't be focusing on that right now. She has other priorities.

"I told you, I look at you and I see a target. So stay _away_ from me, Supergirl. Don’t come any closer."

"My name is Kara!" she yells, and Alex takes a step back, blade drawing a little more from its lead-lined sheath. "I haven't been Supergirl in six months. I became Supergirl to save you from a plane crash, and I stopped being her the moment you stopped breathing, okay?!"

Kara's eyes are wide. Oh, Rao.

Alex's fist clenches on the knife, before she forces it back into its lead lining. "I should go. I can't be around a Super." She rubs her eyes, the next words muttered to herself. "This was a bad idea."

Go? No. Kara's eyes widen. "Alex, please!" She needs to do something, needs to think of something. "…Give me…one minute to convince you to stay. One minute." 

"…Please?"

Alex growls low in her throat. "You have forty seconds. Starting now."

Forty seconds. Okay. She expected that, actually. She can work with that.

She superspeeds away, closing the restroom door behind her.

Three seconds later, she opens the door again, stepping out wearing her comfiest pajamas (okay, maybe the shirt is one of Alex's, sue her), hair tied back and glasses adorning her face. If not for the scalpel cuts covering her arms, she'd look just like a normal person.

Nothing like her red-and-blue superhero persona.

She approaches slowly, hands clasped awkwardly in front of her, before she gets close enough and stops, adjusting her glasses. "Hi."

Eleven seconds well spent.

Alex frowns, staring at her as she approaches. "You look…different. Softer."

"You said you couldn't be around a Super. That when you see me you just see a target for you to kill. So I thought…maybe you'd feel less tense around me like this. Not a Super. Just…Kara."

Alex thinks about it, weighing words on her tongue.

Forty seconds comes and goes.

Kara braces herself for Alex to leave. For her to walk out of Kara's life.

"…Is that my shirt?" she says, instead.

Oh.

She remembers it? Kara beams, giddily, and nods. "Yeah. You, uh…you left a lot of clothes here the last time you stayed the night. I think half my wardrobe is actually your shirts at this point."

Alex blinks. "…Are you sure 'sisters' is the story for us you're sticking with?"

Kara flushes bright red, clearing her throat. "We're, um. We were…close."

"Yeah, I'm gettin' that impression."

Kara tries to rapidly shift the topic, because oh, Rao, that's embarrassing to talk about. She is _so_ not talking about that right now. "So you, uh…you remember this shirt?"

"Things are…familiar. Here or there. Sometimes. I get flickers at the corner of my mind, like I know something. But nothing's _solid_. If I try to think about it too hard, it just…vanishes." She groans in frustration, flexing her fingers. "I look at you, and you say 'sister', but I just…I don't feel it. Before, I saw a Super. Someone for me to hate, and to hunt, and to kill. Now, with the glasses, and with those clothes, I just…"

Kara takes a step closer, cautious. "You just?"

"I just…" Alex rubs the back of her neck. "…see a girl. A girl I'd…like to get to know better." She pauses. "If you wanted."

The two of them stand there, staring, and it feels a little bit like a fresh start.

"Well then. In that case…hi there." Kara raises one hand and holds it out for a handshake. "I'm Kara Danvers. It's nice to meet you."

Alex smiles, softly, and takes Kara's hand with her own flesh-and-blood one. "It's nice to meet you too." She shakes it, once, but doesn't let go. "I'm Alex Danvers."

For the first time in a long time, Kara breathes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _So, there we have it. I've had ideas for an Alex-gets-captured-and-brainwashed-by-Cadmus AU for a long time, and pretty quickly after thinking of it I realised it would work as a Winter Soldier Alex AU. And, when Silverwriter01 mentioned hurt/comfort and hating-to-loving? I had to make my concepts reality. I hope you liked it, silverwriter01, and I hope everyone else who reads it enjoys it!_


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